She resumed her stirring of the stew. The oddest thing about the whole day had been that journey in which they had been led to Zebra Drive and her very own house. That had been a moment of utter astonishment, enough to make one laugh, although she had resisted the temptation to do so. Of course she had entertained the possibility that her house had previously been occupied by the Canadian doctor and his family, only to dismiss the proposition immediately. She knew that her house had belonged to the Public Works Department from its first construction in the mid-sixties, and that it had been the official residence of the deputy head of the Public Works right up to the point at which it had been sold off as surplus to requirements. That was when she had bought it, using her legacy from her father—the legacy of fine cattle that had so prospered out at the cattle post. It had never been a medical house, or a missionary house for that matter, and what was more, there was no large jacaranda tree in the yard. There were acacias and that favourite mopipi tree of hers, but no jacaranda. No, that claim by Mma Not Rosie must have been entirely made up.

Once the children had finished their meal they settled in their bedrooms—Motholeli to read and Puso to complete his arithmetic homework. Mma Ramotswe and Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni went out onto the verandah; night had fallen with the suddenness of those latitudes, a curtain of darkness that came down after only a few minutes of dusk, heralding a world of dark shapes, of night-time sounds, of mystery, and, at times, of fear. They sat in their customary chairs and looked out beyond the small circle of light that the window behind them threw into the yard. Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni had poured himself a cold beer; Mma Ramotswe had the half-glass of lemonade that she had saved from the day before. The effervescence of the lemonade had all but disappeared, but enough of the taste remained to make the drink palatable. She sipped at it slowly; the acidity made her teeth tingle. Red bush tea never did that, she thought.

He told her about his day. Fanwell had succeeded in finding the cause of an engine fault that had flummoxed him for two days. “I couldn’t work out what was going on,” he said. “It was not one of these cars that have all the computers in them—it was a good, honest car. But I couldn’t for the life of me see why it was overheating—and then Fanwell found the problem. It took him half an hour.”

“That means he has become a good mechanic,” said Mma Ramotswe.

“Or I’m becoming a bad one,” remarked Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni, taking a sip of his beer.